"Acting?" Lanyard repeated, intrigued by the acuteness of this masterful woman's mentality.
"Precisely—pretending you were a common thief. For a moment you actually made me think you afraid of me. But you're neither the one nor the other. How do I know? Because you're unarmed, your voice has changed in the last two minutes to that of a cultivated man, you've stopped cringing and started thinking, and the way you walked across the floor and handled that chair showed how powerfully you're made. If I didn't have this revolver, you could overpower me in an instant—and I'm no weakling, as women go. So—why the acting?"
Studying his captor with narrow interest, Lanyard smiled faintly and shrugged, but made no answer. He could do no more than this—no more than spare for time: the longer he indulged madame in her whim, the better Lucy's chances of scot-free escape. By this time, he reckoned, she would have found her way through the service gate to the street. But he was on edge with unending apprehension of mischance.
"Come, come!" Madame Omber insisted. "You're hardly civil, my man.
Answer my question!"
"You don't expect me to—do you?"
"Why not? You owe me at least satisfaction of my curiosity, in return for breaking into my house."
"But if, as you suggest, I am—or was—acting with a purpose, why expect me to give the show away?"
"That's logic. I knew you could think. More's the pity!"
"Pity I can think?"
"Pity you can get your own consent to waste yourself like this. I'm an old woman, and I know men better than most; I can see ability in you. So I say, it's a pity you won't use yourself to better advantage. Don't misunderstand me: this isn't the conventional act; I don't hold with encouraging a fool in his folly. You're a fool, for all your intelligence, and the only cure I can see for you is drastic punishment."